Toby Hall, who has an inside track on C2, has been shut down due to shoulder problems.
“I think the second day he started having some issues with his shoulder,” Cooper said of Hall. “I think he actually had problems with it last year. At the end of the year he got injured playing first base, I think, and apparently it just started bothering him here the last few days, so we had an MRI done.”
"Your adrenaline goes out there and you're swinging hard," Hall said. "It was a pitch down and away and I went and got it and felt a weird burn."
Should this be permanent, it would indicate Q is C1, leaving Towles and Palmisano to fight it out for C2 (and remember Palmisano's Rule 5 status).
"We have some kids who can actually do it if it doesn’t pan out for Toby. We’re hoping he’s going to be fine and be able to get some work in here maybe later on in the spring and really have an opportunity to be with us.”
One also might think this would be a perfect time to sign a veteran catcher, albeit a veteran catcher who looked like a Backstreet Boy the spring after the drug testing program was revamped. But you would not be thinking like Ed Wade:
"We're not signing Pudge," Wade said. "Put that one to rest. We have no expectation to sign Pudge."
We didn't come out here to play tiddlywinks, son.
-Hal Smith